In October 2017 , astronomers discovereda peculiar objectin the Solar System . Its flight and speed propose that it came from a different star system entirely . It was name ' Oumuamua , which translates as " sentinel " in Hawaiian , by astronomers at the University of Hawaii ’s Institute for Astronomy , where it was first observed . Over the few weeks that it was visible it reveal many other peculiarity , which led some scientists to speculate that our first interstellar visitor may really be artificial in stemma .
That idea , however , was give the axe by most stargazer as a nebulous root to a complex question , one that required very piffling explanation . “ It ’s extraterrestrial being ! ” is an effective approach to color over that which we do not bed . Just to be trusted , however , investigator have looked for several signatures that may indicate grounds of extra - terrestrial technology and total backempty - handed .
The International Space Science Institute ‘ Oumuamua team aim out in a new paper published inNature Astronomy , that the while the alien space vehicle is a “ fun idea ” , everything see so far can be explain by born phenomena , and so it is much more likely it has a rude origin . That ’s not to say we sleep with everything about the objective , but just because ‘ Oumuamua does n’t play like anything else in our Solar System , does n’t intend there are picayune immature people behind it .
" We put together a strong team of experts in various different area of work on ' Oumuamua . This cross - pollenation lead to the first comprehensive analytic thinking and the best magnanimous - picture summary to date of what we know about the target , " corresponding source Matthew Knight , from the University of Maryland , say in astatement .
Among ‘ Oumuamua ’s many specialness , its anatomy and rotation jump out . It ’s an elongate cigar - like physical object spinning around its longest axis vertebra . It also seems to have accelerated as it cross the Solar System . This is not particularly unusual , comet know that , but ‘ Oumuamua has none of the major outgassing hallmarks of cometic bodies .
" We have never go through anything like ' Oumuamua in our solar system . It ’s really a enigma still , " Knight said . " We tend to strike that the physical summons we note here , close to home , are universal . This thing is weird and admittedly hard to explain , but that does n’t exclude other natural phenomenon that could explicate it . "
The object is now too dim to be studied , so our understanding of it will only expand as we learn more about these interstellar visitors . Some statistic suggest up to 10,000 of these little rocks are within our Solar System at any given sentence , and with telescope like as theLarge Synoptic Survey Telescope(LSST ) total online in the next three age , we will start out see more of them .
" In the next 10 years , we bear to begin witness more object like ' Oumuamua . The LSST will be leaps and saltation beyond any other sight we have in terms of capability to observe small interstellar visitor , " Knight said . " We may start assure a novel objective every class . That ’s when we ’ll start out to have a go at it whether ' Oumuamua is weird , or common . If we find 10 - 20 of these things and ' Oumuamua still looks unusual , we ’ll have to reexamine our explanation . "
